Philips Sells TV Brand to Chinese

Royal Philips Electronics, the Dutch conglomerate, is selling a controlling interest of its 80-year-old TV division to Hong Kong based TPV Technology Ltd.

Philips will retain a 30 percent interest and receive royalties, but this clearly puts the Chinese company in the driver's seat. The TV division's 4000 employees will be transferred to the new company and no layoffs have been announced.

The Dutch company had been trying to make the TV division profitable for more than a decade. It joins a bunch of other businesses Philips has exited, including semiconductors, mobile phones, and PCs. The PC division was also sold to TPV.

Philips continues to manufacture lighting, health care, and small CE products such as electric toothbrushes and shavers.

To Americans, who watched our historic TV brands disappear during the 1980s and '90s, the story is nothing new. Philips itself snatched up Magnavox. The RCA TV business ended up in the hands of Chinese TCL. Zenith was bought by GoldStar, now LG.